


it's been so long, so long

by humancorn



Series: SPN Ficlets [4]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angelic Grace Bonds (Supernatural), Angst, Apocolypse was Solved without Sam Going to Hell, Author Makes Up Her Own Lore Because She Can't Find Any Information on Angel Feather Lore, Crowley & Bobby's Shared Hellhound is named Darla, Established Castiel/Dean Winchester, Established Crowley/Bobby Singer, Everything After Season 5 Didn't Happen, Flashbacks, Fluff and Angst, Fuck the Canon, Gabriel Being Gabriel, Gabriel Makes Great Coffee, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Hurt Gabriel (Supernatural), Implied/Referenced Character Death, Improper use of Prayer, M/M, Magic, Mutual Pining, Not Canon Compliant, Pining, Sam is a Slut for Coffee, angel feathers, ooooo i'm so excited!!!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-29
Updated: 2019-01-06
Packaged: 2019-07-04 02:31:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15831924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/humancorn/pseuds/humancorn
Summary: Charcoal-ash wing imprints on dingy motel dining room carpeting; a bright and ancient soul lost on the outskirts of Muncie fucking Indiana.If Gabriel really died, who's sending Sam coffee every morning?





	1. i wanna see you tonight, would you come for a drive?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All of the chapter titles are from The Gaslight Anthem's "Mae".

When all of this had started, Sam wasn’t expecting to get swept up in it. But that’s always how it goes, isn’t it? You aren’t looking for love when you find it. You’re looking for something else – success, glory, money, power, a way out, or in Sam’s case? A good solution to the Apocalypse. A viable way to stop he and Dean and the rest of the goddamn human race from dying. And that solution, at one point, involved talking to a trickster that was too powerful for his own good, who turned out to be an archangel that cared too much for his own good. Not that he’d admit that to anyone in such plain words. 

 

A bond was formed that day, in that damp-dark warehouse in Wellington, Ohio. The Trickster’s eyes seemed to spark the moment Sam spoke, but he remained motionless within the ring of fire. The Winchesters left, and as the sprinklers slowly diffused the fire still blazing around him, Gabriel realized how fucked he was. He dragged a hand down his face and let out a low chuckle. Gabriel followed them from that day on, looking after them and dwelling on what might have been, what  _ could be.  _ If only after if only. He was in the back of the impala everyday, lovingly curled up into the leather seats, ever-present cherry lollipop pressed against the inside of his cheek as he teased Dean and flirted shamelessly with Sam. Each night, he silently aided Sam into sleep, willing away the demons by walking through his dreams. Unseen, of course, and never when Lucifer was there. He only butted in with cases when absolutely necessary, saving them from a vampire or two and aiding them silently in finding the first of the four horsemen’s rings when they were hopelessly lost. And then? Well.  _ Fuck.  _

 

Suddenly, the trickster Sam had grown to  ~~ love  ~~ _ tolerate  _ was gone _.  _ Poof. Right up in thin air - just...gone. Charcoal-ash wing imprints on dingy motel dining room carpeting; a bright and ancient soul lost on the outskirts of Muncie fucking Indiana. Protecting them, protecting  _ him, protecting Dean, of all people.  _ They arrive at a different motel for the night and Dean heads off to get some food. Sam knew it would take him a bit longer to come back, as much as he griped about Dean not understanding him, this was something he never seemed to get wrong. He knew when Sam needed to grieve. It didn’t seem to matter that the person, or  _ being _ , that he was grieving was Gabriel.  He cried that night, for the first time in a long time, to the point where he ended up with hiccups from gasping too much air into his lungs. He laughed then, thinking about how Gabriel would have told him he was stupid for crying, would have told him to smile, and would have laughed with him as he fought through the hiccups, even though tears were still steadily flowing down his cheeks. 

 

It took a few weeks. A few weeks of Sam praying and not being answered for it to  _ really  _ sink in that Gabriel probably wasn’t going to walk through their motel door at any given moment, wasn’t going to flutter into the impala’s back seat like nothing had happened, wasn’t going to be there when Sam needed an extra hand in the library, wasn’t going to be waiting for him to wake up, coffee in hand, another mug for Sam sitting on the bedside table. And it  _ hurt _ : a slow-burning ache in the pit of his stomach, reaching up occasionally into his lungs and engulfing him in nervous shakes and stuttered breaths. 

 

Months had passed since Lucifer and Michael had been locked away in the cage, and Sam still prayed to Gabriel, still said his name every night before bed: an outstretched apology, a run-down of recent events, or the odd confession. 

 

_ “I miss the way you made my coffee. You never told me how you did it, and I haven’t been able to get it right.  Was it some sort of weird angel mojo? I want to know.” _

 

_ “Dean got hurt on a rugaru hunt today. I wish you could’ve seen the look on Cas’ face when we got back to Bobby’s. It was priceless. Dean’s still acting like there’s nothing going on there, but I know better.” _

 

_ “I keep thinking about that one pick-up line you used to use on me all the time and I can’t remember how it ends. Every time I google it, I just end up getting heart condition web pages.” _

 

_ “Dean played Heat of the Moment while he was making breakfast this morning. I know he’s doing it to try to coax me out of my room, but fuck, was I not ready for it. I taught Cas a few of the pick up lines I’d come across while looking around. Hearing Dean almost choke on bacon after Castiel said, “Have you been covered in bees recently? Because you look sweeter than honey,” was pretty good payback. Still haven’t found the end to yours, yet.” _

 

_ “There was a woman who looked a lot like you at the library today. Her eyes were blue, though.” _

 

Today had been a long day, driving back to Bobby’s from a hunt in middle-of-nowhere southwest Ohio. Seventeen hours in the car with Dean. Seventeen hours of attempting to sleep and failing because Castiel kept fluttering in and out like an indecisive hummingbird. Seventeen hours of hoping and being disappointed that the voice coming from the backseat was low and rough, and entirely too serious. 

 

Sam sighed, laying back on his bed. His eyes closed as he stretched out, a few of his bones crackling and popping as he adjusted to not being cramped in the passenger seat of the impala. Without even thinking about it, he whispered Gabriel’s name.

 

_ “I miss you.”  _ The words left Sam’s lips, and he almost instantly regretted it, dragging a heavy hand down his face. He needed to get a life. He needed to stop dwelling on this...this  _ thing... _ that may or may not have actually been a thing. He needed to get some sleep. As Sam closed his eyes and began to drift off, part of his brain registered the faint smell of hazelnut. 

 

Sam awoke the next morning feeling only slightly groggy and headed down to the kitchen to grab some much-needed caffeine. Dean sat at the small dining table, nursing a cup of coffee and scarfing down what seemed to be a cherry danish. Newspaper laid open on the table, though Dean didn’t seem to be reading it as he stared off into oblivion. Obviously he was still waking up. 

 

“Any coffee left?” Sam asked. Dean nodded at him and gestured toward a mug on the counter, already filled to the brim with coffee. He nodded back in thanks and sat down opposite of Dean, absently taking a sip and--oh... _ oh _ … _ what.  _ Sam blinked down at the mug, staring into the cream-brown mixture, brow furrowing. Carefully, he took another sip. And  _ yeah, that was definitely not what he expected. How could this be--? How? He’d been trying to make it like this for so long and Dean had just done it like it was...nothing? Like he just did this every day?  _

 

Sam cleared his throat, “Dean, did you...make this coffee?” 

 

“No. Was out here when I got up. Thought Bobby made it.” Dean replied, taking another danish from the plate in the middle of the table. And... _ was Sam crazy or were all of those danishes not there when he’d first come into the kitchen.  _ Briefly, Sam considered the possibility of demonic interference, but that thought was stifled as he felt a hand ruffle through his hair. He turned quickly, only to catch a glimpse of something out of the corner of his eye and then nothing. Sighing, Sam let out the breath he’d been holding in and stood to go to his room.

 

_ “Thank you for the coffee.”  _ Sam breathed as he took another sip, wrapping himself in his comforters and praying Dean wouldn’t find a case for today.

 

Another coffee, this time on his bedside table, appeared the next morning. It was still hot when Sam curled his fingers around the handle, steam curling into the chilled air.  He held it close, let the mug warm his hands, and savoured it. Faintly, he thought he could feel something ghosting over his skin, like someone was almost but just-barely-not touching him, though he could see nothing was physically there. The feeling left as he finished off the mug, and Sam frowned at the absence. Time to go on about the rest of his day.


	2. you can lean into me, if you ain't been in love for a while

_ “I wish you were here.”  _ Sam murmured. It had been almost a month since the first mug of coffee had appeared on Bobby’s counter. They came daily now, always in his favorite mug if they were at home or in his travel mug (that he now almost religiously carried around with him) if they were on a case. Sam had long since accepted that Gabriel was probably fucking with him or didn’t want to actually see him,  ~~ or maybe, he reasoned, he was actually still very much dead.  ~~ Over the sound of the shower, Sam could have sworn he heard a flutter of wings. For a moment, he considered that maybe Castiel had angel-teleported into the bathroom with him, but that really didn’t seem likely. Cautiously, Sam turned off the water and wrapped a towel around his hips, peeking out the shower curtain to see no one in the bathroom with him. He stepped out of the shower and leaned against the sink, resting his head in his hands. This was pathetic. It had been almost a year since Gabriel passed and what did he have to show for it? A few cups of coffee. The occasional ghostly caress. Nothing that was  _ enough. _

 

He let out a long sigh and went about toweling off his hair, staring absently at his reflection in the broad motel-bathroom mirror. There were more scars than untouched flesh, now. His fingertips trailed over one right above his hip--a simple but ragged knife wound he’d gotten when hunting a werewolf. He could still remember the feel of Gabriel’s too-hot skin holding pressure over his gaped flesh, gentle but firm as he healed it shut. And then, something caught Sam’s eye--a metallic glint on top of the towels laid out behind him. A feather. A gold-shining, glittering-with-the-light-of-one-thousand-suns  _ feather _ . 

 

Sam hesitated for a moment before picking it up, but the feather oddly seemed to call to him, which was a bit concerning but altogether not too odd, considering his background. The moment his skin touched the edge of the  ~~ unbelievably soft  ~~ plume, electricity seemed to rush through his bones and  _ God  _ he was not prepared for the headrush of  _ words _ exploding into his brain. It took him a moment, scratch that, it took him a  _ couple minutes  _ to process what had just happened as the static faded away. Gabriel’s voice. That was... _ Gabriel’s voice _ . Slowly, he parsed together some of the things he’d heard:

 

_ “Sam.”  _

 

_ “Sam, I…” _

 

_ “I miss...you...too...”  _

 

_ “I’m  _ **_sorry_ ** _.”  _

 

He almost dropped the feather. Almost. Instead, he quickly threw on the pair of jeans he’d laid out before he had gotten in the shower, and dashed out of the bathroom. Thankfully, Castiel was still in the motel room. 

 

“Ah, Sam.” Castiel greeted him with a small smile, “Dean just headed out to get food for us. He shouldn’t be too long.” And then Sam saw Cas’ eyes flicker down to his hand, to the feather still clutched between his fingers, and the look of surprise that crossed Castiel’s face was something he hadn’t seen in a  _ long  _ time. 

“Cas--” Sam croaked out, his throat dry and unwilling to make much sound.

 

“Where did you get that?” Castiel was out of his seat now, and stalking over to him. 

 

Sam cleared his throat and swallowed, “It was in the bathroom when I got out of the shower. I picked it up and...Gabriel’s voice was  _ in my head _ ?” Castiel stood in front of him, eyes never leaving the feather. 

 

“Gabriel is alive.” Castiel said, his voice sounding oddly somber. 

 

“He’s alive?” Sam questioned, “Then why isn’t he  _ here _ ? Why is he just sending coffee and....feathers?” 

 

“This isn’t good.” And then Cas was gone. And Sam was alone. Alone, with one of Gabriel’s feathers slotted between his fingers. 

 

_ “Gabriel,” Sam prayed, “I hope you’re alright.” _


	3. we work our fingers down to dust, and we wait for kingdom come

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> where is castiel?

When Dean arrived back at the motel with food, Sam was still standing in the middle of the room, eyes focused on the feather as he twisted it around in his fingers. It seemed to shimmer in the even the barest light - the dim bulbs of the hotel lamps reflecting off and making it look like he’d absolutely doused the thing in a tub of glitter.

 

“Sammy?” Dean set the bags of food down in the small table in the corner and made his way over to Sam. His eyes followed Sam’s gaze down to the feather and Sam could hear Dean take in a sharp breath. “ _ Sammy.”  _

 

“No,” Sam said. Dean placed a hand on his shoulder, and Sam could feel tears welling in his eyes. In his head, he could still hear the echoes of Gabriel’s voice-- _ ”I miss you. I’m  _ **_sorry._ ** _ I miss you. I’m  _ **_sorry,_ ** _ ”-- _ and fear washed over him, goosebumps pricking up on his arms. He could feel pain, and he could feel  _ need.  _ Was it Gabriel’s? Or was it his own? Sam wasn’t entirely sure, if he was honest.  __

 

“ _ Where’s Cas? _ ” Dean said, his hand now firm on Sam’s shoulder, “Sammy?  _ Sam. Look at me _ .”

 

Dean guided him to sit down at the table and wrapped a blanket around his shoulders. Sam could tell that his brother was internally panicking--he was not the most adept at dealing with emotional situations, and Sam crying his eyes out while holding a feather was probably more confusing than anything else. Eventually, Dean slipped the feather from his fingers and wrapped in a napkin, placing it gingerly on the table in front of him. 

 

“What’s going on, Sammy?” Dean asked. His voice was uncharacteristically soft, and vaguely it reminded Sam of when he would get sick when they were kids. False bravado gone and all that’s left is a scared  ~~ little boy ~~ man who’s trying his best to make things better. Sometimes it was easy to forget that. Sam sat there for a moment, attempting to force down the soreness that seemed to be caught in his throat.

 

“Gabriel is alive.” Sam whispered, and Dean visibly stilled, “Gabriel is  _ alive.”  _ Sam repeated. 

 

\------

 

Castiel had been gone for 3 days. Castiel had been gone for 3 days and Dean was frustrated and Sam was still freaking the  _ fuck  _ out about Gabriel being alive. The monster they’d been hunting had been rounded up on day 2 of Castiel’s absence. It had been messier than they’d intended - Dean had needed to blow off some steam and Sam was not about to get in his way. By the end of it Dean had a pretty large gash on his left calf and they both knew there was something wrong when Castiel hadn’t answered Dean’s prayer  _ then _ . Some old floss, shot of whiskey, and a little bit of needlework on Sam’s end and everything was right as rain, at least in the context of flesh. They hightailed it back to Bobby’s after that, hoping he would have some insight on what angel feathers. Unfortunately, the older hunter had nothing. No lore, no rumors, no books. Eventually, after an entire night of sleepless searching, they all headed off to get a little bit of rest. Start fresh in the morning, maybe find something they missed the night before. 

 

And that’s when they found it -- a black feather resting on top of the sheets in Dean’s bed at Bobby’s house. Dean had been about to give Sam a book he’d borrowed when they noticed it -- a stark contrast of black plume on beige bedding. 

 

“Are Castiel’s--” Sam didn’t get to finish that sentence, as Dean clapped a hand on his shoulder. 

 

“Yeah.” Dean whispered, carefully stepping over to the bed and hovering over it, like it would burn him if he touched it. 

 

“If it’s the same...as, well, Gabriel’s, you may want to sit down.” Sam said, soft and comforting as he could possibly achieve with his blood singing in his ears and his heart threatening to beat out of his chest. Hesitantly, Dean reached out for the feather. His fingertips barely skirted around the edge of the plume, and Sam could hear the sharp intake of breath. 

 

“Dean,” Sam said, laying a hand on his brother’s shoulder as he stood there, motionless, fingertips stilled on the vane of the feather. Slowly, Dean looked up at him, and Sam could see barely contained tears in his brother’s eyes. 

 

“Leave.” Dean said. And Sam, being the good brother that he was, did  _ not _ need to be told twice. Book in hand, he was out the door in record time and already doing mental math on how to apologize to Dean for pulling him-- _ them _ , into this. He needed to get something. A peace offering. A “sorry my not-boyfriend may have abducted? killed? done something weird? to your boyfriend?” offering. 

 

A few hours later, and Sam returned with a new bag of coffee grounds, two small containers of chocolate mousse, and  a cherry pie. It was one of the cheap pies from the 24-hour diner in town, but it would have to do. Carefully, Sam set it in the fridge, trying to balance it on top of everything else that was crammed into it. He could feel those almost-not-there fingers on him, they had been there since he’d stepped into the impala, gripping tight to his thigh and ghosting over the exposed flesh of his forearm. This was the longest that this particular sensation had lasted, and Sam was unsure if he was imagining it at this point. The fingers traced down his arm, stopping just above the curve of his wrist, circling around it and then disappearing. Sighing, Sam closed the refrigerator and headed up to his room. 

 

_ “I got some of that mousse you like. Figured if you can give me coffee, maybe you can also pick up a mousse.”  _  Sam prayed, one cup of mousse sat on the bed in front of him, spoon laid neatly on top of the lid, and the other resting on his leg. He closed his eyes, hoping that when he opened them that the mousse would be gone. A minute ticked by, and then two, then three, and Sam felt nothing. Everything was still the same when he opened his eyes. Grumbling to himself, Sam popped off the lid to his mousse and set the other on his bedside table for the night. 

 

When he woke the next morning, his favorite mug was sitting in place of the mousse. 


	4. Lay my head, under the water; Aloud I pray, for calmer seas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bit of Dean-centric DeanCas filler as well as some Crobby bc I was in that kinda mood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry if this chapter is weird and/or there are any spelling/grammer mistakes, it's been a hell of a weekend and I just kinda want to get this chapter out of my hair for now. 
> 
> Thank you for all of your support so far!
> 
> (This chapter title is from "Under the Water" by The Pretty Reckless)

**_Three Weeks Later_ **

 

Dean sat at the kitchen table, twelve individually spaced black-as-night feathers laid out before him as he thumbed through the yellowed pages of a somewhat-ancient text on trickster gods. His eyes kept blurring, not quite able to read the words in front of him, but his fingers turned the pages all the same. The night outside is loud--crickets singing and the far-off sound of cars whirring past on a rural highway. Bobby had headed off to catch some shut-eye a few hours ago. Sam was in the living room, searching for something on his laptop with the television going at a low hum. This should feel normal. Should feel good, even. Sammy was safe, Bobby was alive and well, and the world wasn’t ending. Or, at least if it was, he didn’t know about it. Cas wasn’t here. Cas hadn’t been here in a few weeks. Almost a month. And there was a heaviness in Dean’s stomach, a constant breathlessness in his lungs. It didn’t feel right without Cas here. 

Chilled night air drifted in from the open kitchen window, tugging lightly at the pages of the text he hadn’t been able to focus on for hours. Dean closed the book and let his eyes slip shut. 

 

_ It was colder, all those nights ago. A bit muggier. They were hunting a pack of werewolves, trying to get back into the swing of things after dealing solely with the apocalypse for close to a year. The pack was active near Bobby’s house, so they settled down, enjoyed the comforts of having their own bedrooms for once. Hunting werewolves would be a walk in the park, almost ingrained in them by now, like riding a bike. And yet, as Sam and Bobby both eventually surrendered to sleep, Dean sat at the kitchen table, guns laid out, meticulously cleaning and checking and reassembling. Castiel was beside him, sitting too close, his knee resting against Dean’s thigh as he stared out the window. If they weren’t alone, maybe Dean would have told him to move.  _

 

_ An hour passed, and Dean had cleaned all of the guns he had brought in with him. The clock on the stove read 2:18am and Castiel was still beside him. His hand was on Dean’s arm, stilling his hand before he could move to start cleaning the first gun for a second time. _

 

_ “It’s clean.” Castiel said, and Dean relented, though Castiel did not move his hand. They stayed like that for a few minutes, bile rising up into Dean’s throat as his heart beat quicker and quicker until Cas took his hand away. He started on the first gun again, and Castiel’s hand moved to his thigh, warm even through the thick, lined fabric of his jeans. Cas didn’t say anything else that night, but he stayed with him until morning, got up from his chair around 8am and started a new pot of coffee.  _

 

_ People always talk about realizing you’re in love like it’s some grand event. Like it washes over you when you least expect it, like a grand romantic gesture would suddenly have you struck head-over-heels for someone. And Dean was sure that for some people, that may be how it happened. But loving Castiel? Realizing that he was in love with Castiel? Felt like breathing. Felt like laughing. Felt like something that had always been there. Felt like  _ **_home_ ** _. It was nights like these, nights where his anxiety, his paranoia overwhelmed him and made him feel like he couldn’t breathe, that really nailed the coffin. Soft reassurances, warm comfort, no pushing, no prying, just letting him work through it on his own, but still there if he felt he needed help.  _

 

_ They returned home from the hunt without injury and Castiel guided him to his room, settled him down on his bed and told him to sleep. He did not protest when Dean pulled him down into the covers with him, apart from pausing to slip off his shoes before curling around him and entwining their fingers together.   _

 

Dean jolted back into awareness as Sam shuffled into the kitchen, the old, worn-down floorboards creaking beneath his feet, coffee mug in hand and a golden feather sticking out of the pocket of his robe. Groggily, Dean wondered if Sam was aware that the feather was there. They seemed to show up in the oddest of places; places where they shouldn’t be able to be without someone having noticed them being placed there.  Every day there seemed to be a black feather tucked away somewhere Dean knew it hadn’t been the previous day. They hadn’t talked about it, but Dean knew that the same thing was happening with Sam. Golden feathers hidden away in his clothes, his shoes, his bed. Each feather Dean saw was less pure-gold and more of a shining amber, though he was half-sure that may be his mind playing tricks on him. They had been cooped up in Bobby’s house all week, reading text after text, poring over websites on angel feather lore, only to find nothing. Absolutely nothing. Just the odd historical reference to wings as a whole, or whackjobs on religious forums talking about how “angel feathers were messages from God himself” or “it means He is near”. 

 

“Find anything?” Sam’s voice was rough and Dean got a sudden, unbidden urge to pour some honey in Sam’s coffee. 

 

“Nope.” Dean said, snapping hsi book shut. He rubbed at his eyes, trying to will the drowsiness from them.  

 

“Same here.” Sam said. He recoiled as the coffee touched his tongue, nose scrunching up in bitter distaste.

 

“Is that coffee still showing up?” Dean asked. If they weren’t in this situation, if Cas was still here, if the threat of not knowing where he was or if he was hurt wasn’t looming over him like a reaper, Dean would probably have teased Sam about getting addicted to trickster coffee. Probably would have been more concerned about it, really. In all reality, they didn’t actually know where the coffee was coming from or what exactly was in it and Dean probably  _ should  _ be more concerned about that. 

 

“Yeah. Every once in a while. Less and less though, lately.” Sam said, and then gestured to the feathers Dean had laid on the table, “More feathers?” 

 

“Every day now.” 

 

“Anything new?”    

 

Dean looked at the feathers, touching his fingertips to the edge of the one that had arrived just this morning. 

 

_ “Hot--eh--” _

 

_ “GedUnPaDonGonGraphUr.” _

 

_ “ _ **_Dean.”_ **

 

**_“_ ** _ Bond.” _

  
  


Shaking his head, Dean chuckled softly, “Just a bunch of broken syllables, my name, and the word ‘bond’.” Dean could see Sam perk up at “bond”.

 

“That’s...interesting.” Sam paused for a moment, “You know, you’ve been getting a lot more feathers than I have.”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Maybe the feathers have something to do with a bond? You and Castiel would obviously have a stronger one...for a variety of reasons. It would make sense that Gabriel and I would have a weak bond. But…” Sam trailed off, eyebrows knitting together. A minute passed and Dean was growing impatient. He wanted this to be done; he wanted Cas back.

 

“But? Out with it, Sammy.” Dean snapped.

 

“Have you been receiving anything other than feathers? Noticing anything missing from your room?  _ Feeling  _ anything strange?” Sam asked, his voice soft, like he didn’t want to bring this up.

 

“No?” Dean answered.

 

Sam hummed and took out his phone, scrolled through something and eventually put the phone up to his ear.

 

“Hey, Crowley.” Sam said, and Dean’s blood ran cold in his veins. 

 

-=-=-=-=

 

Crowley appeared in the living room about 30 minutes later, hellhound in tow, smiling like a goddamn child on christmas morning.

 

“It’s been much too long, darling.” Crowley drawled, eyes focused intently on Bobby. The old hunter sighed and flopped down on the couch, downing the rest of the beer in his hand. 

 

“You saw me this morning, ya old bastard.” Bobby said, expressly trying to ignore all of them. Dean frowned, moving more toward the center of the room, inching in between his surrogate father and the demon.

 

“Love you too, Robert.” Crowley grinned wider and then turned to face Sam, “What’s so special that you needed to call me in, Moose? It’s not like you to call me up for just an evening chat.” 

 

“Cas is missing.” Sam said, “Do you know anything about angel feathers?” 

 

Crowley considered them for a moment, eyes searching for something in Sam’s face before snapping himself up a glass of whiskey.

 

“Get into a scuffle with your boyfriend and he goes missing, so naturally, ask the king of hell to track him down and solve all your problems, eh?” Crowley smirked, focus now shifted to Dean. 

 

“ _ Crowley.”  _ Bobby all but growled from the couch, and Crowley chuckled.

 

“Angel feathers are pretty powerful stuff. They have traces of grace in them. There was a saying in hell, back when I was first recruited, that said something along the lines of: if you need to kill an angel, stab a feather through their heart. Not sure if that’s true, but always worth a shot.” Crowley said, absently patting what Dean assumed to be the hellhound.

 

“Anything about communicating through them? Leaving messages? Clues?” Sam asked.

 

“Back in the day some angels used them to convey messages to humans in their charge without having to physically manifest.” Crowley said. He sat on the couch next to Bobby, shooing the hunter’s legs out of the way so that he would have enough room. 

 

“Could you use Darla to find him?” Bobby asked as something seemed to nuzzle into his lap. 

 

“Hellhounds aren’t really equipped to find angels. Not enough scent to them.” Crowley said.

 

“What if we got some of Cas’ feathers?” Bobby said.

 

“Uhm. Ex _ cuse  _ me?” Dean said, “We’re not using a  _ hellhound  _ to track down Cas.” Sam shot him a look, like he should keep his mouth shut and Dean glared back. There was no way in hell he’d he giving one of Cas’ feathers to Crowley, let alone a  _ fucking hellhound. _

 

“Maybe. No promises.” Crowley continued, ignoring Dean in favor of leaning back into the couch, refilling his empty glass with another snap of his fingers. “It’s been a while since you invited me onto a case. If I help you, what do I--” 

 

Bobby cut him off, “You  _ get  _ to be invited back, idjit.” Bobby folded his feet into Crowley’s lap and Crowley huffed in defeat.

  
“ _ Fine.”  _ Crowley grumbled.


	5. i was born beside a river that flows to a raging sea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Guess who's back? Back again?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for being so slow guys I have been working on Secret Santa stuff since like November. And I lost a little motivation to write this fic after last chapter for some odd reason.

_ “ _ Forgive me if I’m not too on-board with the idea of a fucking  _ hellhound  _ going after Cas.” Dean said for what seemed like the hundredth time. 

 

Sam closed his eyes and hoped Dean would stop repeating the same argument. He wasn’t even saying anything, wasn’t even arguing an opposite point.  _ He  _ didn’t like the idea of a hellhound getting Cas’ scent either, but Bobby had assured them that Darla would be fine, she wouldn’t be too off mission. Sam rolled down the window in the impala, a clear sign that he didn’t want to hear Dean bitch about this anymore, and he could practically feel Dean glaring at him. It wasn’t like Sam wasn’t aware that this was his fault--getting involved with Gabriel in the first place, letting him goad him on with treats of coffee and sweets, letting Castiel disappear. Not doing anything to stop him. Focusing on finding Gabriel instead of finding Cas. He didn’t even know if they were together, if Cas had even found Gabriel or vice versa. He knew Dean was blaming him. As soon as he found that little black feather on Dean’s bed, he knew. Sam sighed and slung his arm out the window, trying to think of anything that wasn’t Castiel, or Gabriel or Dean. He ended on Jess - memories of soft curls tickling his back as she curled around him, kissing his shoulders, his neck, sweet and innocent. And as he drifted off to sleep, he could feel those ghost-like touches slowly tugging through his hair.

 

Sam’s dreams were usually filled with blood and pinprick-silver blades sinking into flesh and black-tinted eyes with rims of red outlining them. Lucifer, the teeth of his vessel rotting and falling to the ground as he approached. But recently, he’d been getting flashes of the Elysian Fields hotel, gore and ash spread out over the carpet like snow blanketing the hills of a rolling valley. Outlines of fallen deities but no trace of the deities themselves. Gabriel’s body wasn’t there, save for the ash imprints of wings. And Sam would usually sit next to them, waiting for something to happen. Waiting for Lucifer to walk through the door and lament him on how Gabriel was dead because of him, on how he’d be back in hell eventually. But Lucifer never came, no one stepped foot into the room as he stared down into charcoal, ran his fingertips along the edges of the raised, forgotten embers. 

 

When he woke, slow and relaxed, there was a paper travel cup in his hand. It was still warm but not burning and Sam knew they needed to head to Indiana. 

 

*****

 

Darla led them to a cornfield in the middle of Iowa. Nothing around for miles except the old, off-white farmhouse that accompanied the field. It was the picture of stereotypical midwestern life. The corn parted with invisible force as Darla made her way through the stalks, Crowley trailing off behind and Sam could practically feel Dean starting to get antsy as soon as they found the first black feather on the ground. A trail of them, hanging off of cornstalks and scattered on the ground like telltale breadcrumbs. They stopped right before a small clearing--probably only three feet wide and two across, which wouldn’t  _ that  _ unusual if there weren’t a giant pile of feathers heaped in the center - all black with the very occasional gold threaded in.

 

“Well?” Dean said, gesturing to Crowley.

 

Crowley gave a gruff chuckle and smiled, “And we wait.” 

 

Dean tried to argue with him, tried to pry another way out of Crowley than just waiting and hoping Castiel would appear in this field in the middle of bumfuck Iowa. 

 

There wasn’t another way. Two days came and went and Sam prayed that this would be over soon, that finding Cas would also find Gabriel and that he’d never have to step foot in the Elysian Fields hotel again. 

 

_ If this has all been an elaborate game, Gabriel, I swear on my grave I’ll kill you.  _ Sam whispered into his coffee when he was finally left alone in the impala. The barely-not-there touches were almost always on him now, sometimes in his hair, but mostly tugging at his wrist or wrapped around his the back of his neck. Trying to lead him somewhere? Maybe this was Gabriel’s way of helping them find Castiel. Hell, maybe whatever the fuck this was wasn’t even  _ Gabriel. Maybe, just maybe, it was Lucifer trying to fuck with him again.  _ Sam shook his head and took another sip of his coffee. 

 

=-=-=-=

 

Five days, three hours, and thirty minutes. Five days. Five days of sitting in the impala, grabbing Dean food, and making increasingly awkward small talk with Crowley whenever he decided to pop in to check on them.  There had been no sign of Castiel apart from the feathers that seemed to appear from thin air over the clearing in the cornfield, and Dean was hoarding them like a madman, attempting to catch each one before it hit the dirt. 

 

“He’s trying,” Crowley whispered from the backseat of the Impala. Sam nearly jumped out of his seat because he definitely hadn’t been there a second ago. 

 

“Who’s trying?” Sam wiped the spilled coffee from the front of his shirt, his eyebrows knitted together in utter exasperation. 

 

“Castiel. He’s going to be exhausted when he gets back. Don’t let your brother be too hard on him. Give him some space.” Crowley smiled at him, and regardless of his status as ‘reformed demon, kind of a good guy now’, that smile still made Sam uneasy. “Not that I care,” Crowley’s smile morphed into a smirk and he was gone a second later.  Sam let out a sigh and cupped his hands around his travel mug. It was almost time to go check on Dean, maybe pick up a sandwich for lunch. A burger from that chain Dean liked might cheer him up a little bit. Probably not, but it was at least worth a shot. 

 

“Sam!” He heard Dean scream not a moment later, “ **_Sam!_ ** ” 

 

Sam bolted into the cornfield, pushing stalks out of his way until he was able to see Dean and...a bright blue-black glow hovering a little ways off the ground, just barely above the pile of feathers. Dean turned to him, eyes wide with panic and fear and what Sam thought may be tears. As he got closer, he could feel it - a damp heaviness settled in his chest so suddenly it almost knocked the wind out of him and Sam could feel tears of his own falling down his cheeks. 

 

“What the fuck happened?” Sam yelled at Dean, as the glow grew brighter and brighter and  _ oh fuck too bright too bright.  _ He grabbed Dean and turned him away from the light, screwed his eyes shut and prayed - to Castiel, to Gabriel, hell, to Balthazar, even to Crowley. Sam wasn’t sure why he was scared, but he was, and it was near overwhelming. It felt like he was suffocating as he tried to drag deep breaths into his lungs. Dean was shouting at him, trying to wiggle out of his arms, but Sam held tight. 

 

And then, just as quick as it had come, the heaviness was gone. Sam tentatively opened his eyes. No more blinding light. A deep groan came from behind them and Dean elbowed him in the stomach, hard enough to  _ actually  _ knock the wind out of him. 

 

“ _ Cas!”  _ Dean’s voice was rough.

 

“Dean.” Cas’ voice sounded even rougher. Dean kneeled beside him and held his hand tight enough that Castiel’s skin was turning white. He looked fine - no blood, nothing seemed to be out of place other than the fact that he was laying perfectly still on the ground in the middle of a corn field in bumfuck Iowa. Dean was checking for injuries, hovering over Cas like an overprotective mom. 

 

“Dean, I’m okay.” Cas whispered, hand cupping Dean’s cheek, pulling him down, and Sam pointed looked away. Because as much as he was glad that they were moving past the whole “no showing affection in front of other people because I have to maintain my hypermasculine ideal image” issue, Sam sure as hell didn’t want to see it. 

 

“Where have you been?” Dean demanded.

 

“I have been...It is a long story. We need to go to Indiana. Now.” Cas said, but neither of them made a move to get up from the ground. Cas was still cupping Dean’s cheek, holding him close, and Sam wondered if three weeks was the longest they’d been apart since the apocalypse. Still, it wasn’t that long. Not enough to warrant, well, this amount of staring. Sam cleared his throat and Dean jumped up almost immediately, helping Cas to his feet and half-carrying him back to the Impala. They laid him out in the back seat, using Dean’s jacket as a pillow. Cas wouldn’t say it, but it was obvious that he was exhausted - dark circles under his eyes, hands trembling ever-so-slightly. Dean was worried, Sam could hear it in his voice, but Cas insisted they get to Indiana as soon as they possibly could, which meant no pit-stops to drop him off at Bobby’s. 

 

“Get some rest, Cas.” Dean squeezed his hand once more before getting in to the driver’s seat, “Where are we going?” 

 

“The Elysian Fields Motel.” Cas breathed, and Sam’s blood ran cold. 


End file.
